CHICAGO -- After his team gave up the most home runs in the National League during the regular season -- and another four in two playoff games -- Chicago Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said that his focus this winter will be on improving the pitching staff and that nothing is off the table.
"From a pitching standpoint this year, it was sort of a struggle from the get-go," Hoyer said Friday in his end-of-year news conference. "Overall, the quality of the pitching has to improve. The great majority of our focus [this winter] is going to be on pitching acquisition."
The Cubs gave up 12 runs in two games while getting swept by the San Diego Padres in the wild-card round. Hoyer took blame for the bullpen. "I did a poor job in the bullpen this year, full stop," he said, referencing pitchers such as Hunter Harvey and Phil Maton. Harvey never threw a pitch for the Cubs while eating up $6 million in salary. Maton appeared in 31 games, compiling a 6.18 ERA, and is signed for another season at $7.25 million.
Top starters Cade Horton, Justin Steele and Ben Brown missed significant time due to injuries. Kevin Gausman had a 4.83 ERA after coming to the Cubs. Several Cubs pitchers are set to be free agents including Shota Imanaga, David Peterson, Gausman, Clay Holmes and Matthew Boyd.
Source: ESPN MLB · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing